


Communication

by Leidolette



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-30
Updated: 2019-02-06
Packaged: 2019-10-19 17:35:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17605835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leidolette/pseuds/Leidolette
Summary: A collection of short Silna/Goodsir and Silna & Goodsir one shots.2. Silna, in England.





	1. Delicate Work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was delicate work attending to Lady Silence's tongue.

At last, it was Lady Silence’s turn for care. She'd had to wait until all the injured men had been seen to — and there had been many. It had taken hours, and Goodsir’s hands were shaking from exhaustion by the time he got to her. Even now, they were far from alone; injured men on cots filled every available area in the infirmary. 

She had cleaned her face and removed the blood from the top layer of her parka. Besides the worn and pained expression on her face, she appeared much as she did before she’d slipped off to the ice. It was as if they were simply sitting down together for another language lesson. 

That wishful notion was dispelled as soon as she opened her mouth. 

The hollow where her tongue would lay was jarringly empty and blood oozed from what was left of it. There wasn’t much remaining at all of the appendage, and the short stump that still persisted had been sliced cleanly and throughly. Goodsir couldn’t have done much better himself. 

It would certainly need stitching. He showed her the needle and the thread. He hoped that she understood what he going to use it for. 

“Open again, please,” he said the best he could in Inuktitut, and gestured to his own mouth. Silence obliged. 

It was such an awkward area for a wound; a tight fit for even his surgical pliers. He willed his hands to steadiness as best he could, the curved stitching needle he held in the grip of one plier would have nowhere to go except the softness of Silence’s mouth if it went astray. Such delicate work. 

She winced as the thread dragged through the flesh, but kept her mouth open. Goodsir supposed that if she’d had the fortitude to cut it out herself, this paled in comparison. 

He tried to lose himself in the work. If he could just get to that perfect state of concentration, the work would go smoother, and faster. He tried to block out one of the crewmen weeping on his cot, tried to control his bone-deep exhaustion, tried to forget that it was Lady Silence’s injured flesh under his hands. 

And the work did settle him. The stitches came fast and easy —neater now from extensive practice than they had ever been before this voyage. Though Goodsir didn’t love the reason for it, he was glad to see the small, regularly spaced line when he finally tied off the last knot. 

He gave her a solution to wash with and a bowl to spit into, and set set about cleaning the instruments. Then he asked what he’d suspected since he’d seen her staggering into that wretched carnival. “Did you do this to yourself?” he asked gently in Inuktitut. 

She did not answer, either through nod or assenting noise, but the answer was clear enough — even her littlest movements had always seemed so expressive to Goodsir. Thoughts of Silence’s father, and his carvings, drifted through his head. 

He wanted to say ‘don’t hurt yourself again, no matter who asks it of you,’ he wanted to say ‘wash your hands of this mess.’ But he could not bring himself to ask anything of her, even if he meant it for her protection. 

“I don’t... understand, completely, why you’ve done this,” he said instead, haltingly. “But you will always find help here, with me. If I can.” He wasn’t sure if any of this was getting across; his pronunciation was off, and he knew his grammar must be garbled. 

She looked at him with eyes that made no promises, but she made a small, non-commital nod. _Please, believe me,_ he tried to convey through emotion alone. He walked her back to her old berth (cell, was perhaps more accurate), and wished her goodnight. She mouthed the Inuktitut words back at him, which brought a weak smile to his face — his first in a long time. 

It faded quickly, however, back in the infirmary, as cleaned the last remaining blood and gore from his instruments. _Lord, I am so tired,_ he thought, rubbing a newly-washed hand over his face. 

Later, when everything was quiet except for the groans the wounded made in their sleep, Goodsir saw the Netsilik dictionary they'd been working on still on the corner of his desk. It was open to the last page with writing, about a third of the way in. The last word recorded was the Netsilik word for ‘to argue,’ transcribed phonetically, just as Lady Silence had once said it. 

He closed the book and set it on the shelf.


	2. A Tour

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Silna, in England.

~~In another life, Silna sailed to England, and died of tuberculosis within a month.~~

Scratch that.

* * *

~~In another life, Silna sailed to England, and was detested and ostracized by the entire village after Goodsir introduced her to his family.~~

Okay, let's try again.

* * *

In another life, Silna sailed to England, and saw the homeland of the people who had never done her any good. 

She saw their little babies, and their poor slowly dying in their streets. 

She saw their statues and their holidays and their slaughterhouses. 

She saw the little gradations that separated them from each other, even while they lived so shockingly close. 

Horribly, after everything, she saw that they were still people. Of course Silna knew this, had known since she'd seen the face of the man who had killed her father, but it was easier to forget while among threatening, uniformed men than while watching a young girl play with a dog by the roadside. 

One day, over dinner, Goodsir asked if she would ever consider staying there, in England. Not that he was asking her to, he tripped over himself to say. But... could she ever see herself living in this country?

Even if she could speak, Silna would not know what to say. 

She need not stay with him, he hastened to assure, but there were many places in England to go, many sights to be seen. And she would always have a place here, if that was what she desired. 

Silna considered. Perhaps. She had been cast out, if gently, from her own people. There was company here, even with the cruelty and suspicion the crowds could show. There was Goodsir. It wouldn't be the hardest thing she'd ever done. 

Perhaps she could stay. 

A horse trotted by outside the window, the clop of its hooves on the hard-packed road was not the dull thud of rocks falling on ice. The aroma of hot mutton rose up from the plate in front of her -- it was was not whale meat. 

She could stay. But, perhaps, staying was for a Silna in another life.


End file.
